


Loss

by kizzack



Category: Borderlands
Genre: Bonding, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Loss, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-18
Updated: 2014-09-18
Packaged: 2018-02-17 20:18:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2321975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kizzack/pseuds/kizzack
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the death of Handsome Jack, Lilith spends some time alone to gather her thoughts, but is greeted by an unexpected visitor, Zer0 the Assassin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Loss

**Author's Note:**

> I have a character from my own story that I thought would work well as an assassin, so I molded him to fit the Borderlands universe. I wanted to see how well he'd jive and how much I could explore of both him and Lilith. Hopefully you like him!

Sometimes Lilith sat on the cragged outskirts of Sanctuary and allowed her feet to dangle as she stared at the wide expanse of Pandora. Since the “relocation,” as Roland used to call it, the weather had grown colder, and occassionally wind waved throuhg the streets. She enjoyed the cold tossling her hair and the sensation of goosebumps creating little bumpy landscapes on her skin. It all reminded her of home, of sitting in the park on a swingset while snowflakes fluttered down and tangled themselves in her eyelashes. She remembered sitting alone, her Siren wings glowing softly as they shielded her body from the elements. Snow rarely came on Pandora, but when it fell, Sanctuary always grew a little quieter and softer under the icy blanket. Within the same day the Raiders cleared the streets by shoveling the snow off the edge, but they left a few hours open for the kids to play. Lilith hoped snow would fall soon; maybe they cold could harden her heart a little. 

She heard the Vault Hunter approach but said nothing, only lifting her head to stare at the clouds. He made no attempt to sneak, allwing his black boots to loudly crush some of the debries. He stopped a few feet away from her. 

“Mind if I join you?” Since the defeat of Jack, he didn’t speak in haiku nearly as often and he revealed a few more expression settings on his visor. Lilith turned and waved him over, so he sat down next to her; she cocked an eyebrow at him but remained silent. He also let his feet dangle over the edge and he gently kicked them back and forth, a strangely child-like motion that made Lilith stiffen. No one knew much about this particularly Hunter, besides his penchant for haiku, the ghosting ability (which she admittedly thought was awesome), and his sniping skills. Salvador reminisced about his hometown often with his booming voice while sharing drinks with Mordecai and Brick. Her fellow Siren was cool, collected, and polite, and enjoyed chatting with Tannis about science. Lilith was glad Tannis finally had a friend, especially what had happened to Roland. Krieg and Gage got along swimmingly, often going out on wild bandit-killing adventures with Tiny Tina. Yet the Assassin spoke little and tended to stay in the background, exuding a slighly eerie calmness that always reminded everyone of his presence. He snuck off at times, but always returned, and always watched. If it not were the imposing stature, she’d ping him as shy. 

Silence sat with them for a few minutes but he expectedly broke it. “How are you holding up?” Lilith’s gaze snapped over to him and she stared intensely. Then her features softened, but her expression remained quizzical. 

“I’m getting by. It’s different, you know, the dynamic. If that’s what you were asking about, of course.” She laughed nervously. “How about you?” 

“I don’t like having all of this free time. I get to think more often, which isn’t good.” 

She tiled her head a bit. “The change of pace is kinda nice. Also, no Jack.” She waited for an answer but he only stared outward, still kicking his feet. Then he turned to her and a cute smiley face showed up on his helmet’s hologram. She had never seen the “^_^” shape but she couldn’t help but laugh at the odd juxtaposition. He laughed too, a brief “hee hee” that only triggered more giggles from her. “I’m glad you’re showing us more expression. The zero was a little creepy at times.”

He shrugged. “Not as creepy as Krieg.” 

“Nothing’s as creepy as Krieg.” She paused and quirked her lip. “He can’t really help it though, with the whole ‘I’m an unwilling guinea pig for Jack’s horrible experiments’ thing.” 

“True. He can be nice sometimes too, especially to Tina.” 

Lilith nodded. “Yeah, and Brick told me he’s always carrying her on his back like a bandit with a midget. Cute as hell, but also incredibly terrifying. She smiled at him and the little “^_^” appeared again. Her expression changed, though, when she furrowed her eyebrows and gave him a discerning, disconcerting look. “Hey, you never talk this much. You’re always Mr. Roboto lurking in the shadws,” she wiggled her fingers like a villain from an old monster movie, “and we know jack shit about you. Well, I’m assuming for everyone else, but you get what I mean.” 

“Oh.” The emoticon disappeared, and somehow he appeared crestfallen despite the blank screen. For a moment she swore she saw his eyes boring through her. “Well, what do you want to know? I’m not all that special, really.” 

“Not a lot of people can take out a badass loader in one shot, killer. So where’d you learn how to do all that stuff? I don’t think that’s something you’re born with.” 

“I’m not human like you are,” he said somberly. “I look it, sorta, but my race had innate fighting potentia. At least that’s what my dad said.” 

“So you look like one of us under there? Brick’ll have to pay up to Mordecai.. He thought you were a robot, like a cyborg or something.” She laughed, but the assassin looked away and she felt embarrassment warm up her face. “Sorry, that was rude. But we have something in common, right? I’m not technically human either, with the whole Siren business.” His posture softened slightly and Lilith grinned, playfully knocking him on the shoulder. “You mentioned your dad, is that where you learn all those slick ninja moves?” 

“You might’ve heard of him, actually. Hold on, lemme take this off.” 

“Wait, what?” Lilith flinched, shifting away from him a bit. 

“My helmet.” He lifted his hands, placed them firmly on each side, and popped his helmet off, then turned and looked at her. His hair was jet black and tied in a low, small ponytail, with a few free strands sticking out around his forehead. One eye was dark brown, but the other was a filmy white. The skin around the socket was a charred, faded red, and hs eyelid was a thin flap of scar tissue. The damaged continued down his face, partially covering his chin and sprawling down the visible section of his neck. Huge lacerations, deep and black and purple and thick with scar tissue, tore across the landscape of his face. Lilith could even see the remnants of scarring from hastily-stiched thread that hadn’t pulled the wounds on his nose tight enough. His left eyebrow remained intact, while the other was slashed into section. One line cut across his lip diagonally. He smiled faintly, sadness glimmering in his eyes. 

Lilith froze, as if transfixed; her whole body went rigid and her eyes widened. Within a second she shook off the shock, but guilt made her heart knock against her sternum with each beat and stomach acid leapt up and around in her stomach. She knew what look she was giving him, the same one others had directed at her: one of horror mixed with curiosity. She hated herself for it. 

“I should’ve warned you.” His voice betrayed a certain youthfulness, not all matching the metallic tone of before. It was deep, but stil lacked the markings of maturity. 

Lilith remained composed but could not stop words from tumbling out of her mouth. “How old are you?” 

“Eighteen,” he answered matter-of-factly. “So were you expecting a lizard man or something under there?” 

“I’m sorry,” she said abruptly, internally chastizing herself. 

“It wasn’t worth it, but it is what it is. It can’t be helped.” 

“Tannis and Zed could--Ugh, I’m sorry kid. I just didn’t think you were, well, a kid. Christ, you’re only a few years older than Tina and Gage.” 

“Aw c’mon, they’re babies.” He smiled again, his expression brightening. 

“What’s your name? I’m guessing it’s not actually Zero.” 

“I’m Zach.” 

Lilith held out her hand for a shake and he took it. “Well Zach, it’s nice to meet you.” She ignored her realization that he was a missing a finger and kept her gaze fixed on him. “You mentioed your dad, who was he?” 

“Um, he was a Crimson Raider. He’d been a big-time bandit and assassin, but Jack tried to fuck him over so he turned. Oh, you’ve run into my papa as well. He was good buddies with Dr. Tannis and Dr. Zed since he was a scientist too.” He paused and she saw a blush rise in his good cheek, then noticed how pale he was. As she inspected his features, with his arched eyebrows and strong jawline and high cheekbones, a blurry image of a face flitted across her mind’s eye. 

“Was his name Ray?” she asked suddenly. 

His eyes widened in surprise and he nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, they called him Rabid Ray. It was such a stupid nickname, since he was a big softie.” 

“Besides, y’know, when he executed people by ripping their throats out with one hand.” 

“Hey, those guys were rapists and stuf. Papa made him quit it after awhile anyway, he didn’t want me to see too much violence. They tried to raise me to be a pacifist. Obviously that didn’t work out, but then again nothing did.” He shrugged nonchalantly. 

“So where are they? You go visit them when you disappear for days at a time?” 

Zach stared at her and Lilith suppressed a shiver from shaking her. “They’re dead, Lilith.” 

“I--I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” 

“Well he was just another Crimson Raider, so.” A dark anger flew through his face for a moment before being replaced with an annoyed melancholy. “It was such a bullshit way to go, too. Papa got iced by a Hyperion Sniper while Dad was dealing with some ‘bots. They distracted him on purpose. So stupid.” His voice cracked a tad and Lilith noticed his hands shaking ever so slightly. Her stomach dropped when she reach out and put her hand on his, and only sunk further when his eyes narrowed and he snatched his hand away. Then he shook his head, as if to clear his thoughts. “Sorry. I actually haven’t mentioned it since it happened, so it’s kinda raw. Like my face!” He smiled cheekily and pointed at the scarred potion. 

“Goddammit, that is not funny.” Lilith tried to hide a smile but failed. 

Zach just shrugged. “See, jokes work.” 

“Yeah it’s just that was pretty harsh towards yourself, killer.” 

“Seriously, it’s not big deal. Don’t feel bad. It felt better to get it out, to be honest.” His smile had become a ghost of its former self; he stared plainly out into the distance as a soft quiet fell upon both of them. Lilith watched him, studied the various imperfections and old wounds on his face. She remembered tracing the outline of a scar on Roland’s chest as they laid in bed together one night long ago; how he opened one eye and smirked at her; how he touched the blue markings on her markings on her arm; and how fleeting it all was, so easily it was snatched away. She turned away from Zach and exposed on the exposed iron bars and cracked and broken concrete instead. She didn’t want him to see her face. 

“My dad may still be alive.” 

Lilith immediately returned her attention to him, hastily wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. Thankfully he didn’t seem to notice. “How do you know?” 

“It could be fake, just someone fucking with me because they hate me or my family or both.” He chuckled, a sound devoid of any contentment. “I have killed a lot of people. I may deserve someone torturing me, I dunno. But I keep getting ECHOs from him, saying that he’s stuck somewhere in Opportunity, in a prison beneath the city. When I was there I tried to find it. I took Salvador’s advice and even got a hostage. After the third time the guy said he didn’t know, I bashed his fucking face in. Nothing, zero, nada. It didn’t matter when I told them who I was, who my parents were, how I was gonna kill Jack. They all didn’t know and now they’re all fucking dead.” Suddenly he gritted his teeth and shut his eyes, but not before tears began rolling down his face. He put his face in his hands and stared through the spaces in between his fingers. “Does that make me evil, Lilith? They had families too. The bandits did. They used to be regular people and everything was taken away from them.” He dropped his hands, his eyes wide as he seemed to stare from years away, even when he looked at Lilith. “I fucking suck at this. You’re not supposed to feel bad. And I just want to find Dad. Jack’s dead and still nothing. I don’t even know why I’m telling you, you can’t help me.” 

She furrowed her brow, frowning. “Why not? 

“I...I don’t know. I look so weak now, don’t I? I used to get bullied on our old planet at school before Papa expanded his business. I cried a lot. I never defended myself because my parents kept telling me, ‘You’re stronger than you think Zach, you’re just a kid, we’ll teach you how to harness it when you’re older. Just don’t get into any fights.’ Obviously THAT never happened. It’s so easy to kill someone. You just make sure you’ve got the right form and grip, just look down the scope and bam. Unless you’re using a Hyperion sniper rifle, fuck those.” 

“Look, Zach, you don’t have to be this,” Lilith paused, glancing up and twirling her hand as she gathered her thoughts, “cool stoic dude who doesn’t talk to anybody. I don’t think you came and sat with me for no reason.” 

He appeared child-like for a moment with his tear-stained face and big wet eyes. “You looked sad. And...I miss him too. I miss Roland. He was sweet and strong and he said he’d help so when he--since he’s gone, there wasn’t anyone left. I have so few clues to go on, no information either, so I thought I’d be wasting you guys’ time.” 

“Kid, you’re a Vault Hunter and a bonafide badass at that. We owe you one. And now that I know there’s a person under there, I like you even better.” She playfully punched his arm again. “I get feeling conflicted. It’s weird to think about what those people were like before, what made the Hyperion soldiers choose that kind of work, but at the end of the day, you have to remember that this planet changed them. Don’t let it change you.” 

Zach smiled, his face softening, then wiped his face with his arm. “Thanks.” 

“No problem. But don’t do that, you’re gonna get snot on your suit. Your, uh, pop made those, right? I don’t he’d be happy with you getting it dirty.” 

“He wouldn’t be happy about a lot of things,”he paused, swallowing hard, “but I think he’d like you. And everyone else, even Krieg.” 

“That’s good. Now how about we go blow off some steam and kill some varkids.” 

He shook his head rapidly. “Nope. No bugs. Nope nope nope.” 

Lilith laughed and put her hands up in an acquiescing motion. “Okay, bullymongs then?”

“And skags. I fucking hate skags.” 

“All right kid,” she stood up and held a hand out, “we’ll do Roland proud with some good old-fashioned training.” 

He took her hand and got up, then put his helmet on. “Killing skags is fun/Their bites mean nothing to me/Pathetic creatures.” 

“There are those haiku again.” 

“I am a bad ass after all. Gotta sound like it.” 

Before she turned to leave, Lilith swore she saw him smile under there.


End file.
